dave stephens sculptor

Golden Riot

2012-01-20T14:08:00.001-08:00

Those pieces from the picture frame seem to take on new meanings when not containing anything. The riot scene becomes like a map.

london riots 2011

2012-01-16T01:57:00.000-08:00

I produced this sculpture in the summer 2011 in response to the riots in London. I used newspaper photos and a smashed plate. Its not meant to be a comment on the riots rather a response to the imagery that came out of them.

Doorway

2011-12-31T10:12:00.000-08:00

When everything else is quiet and nobody is there to witness......

Growing Black Molecule

2011-12-20T09:44:00.000-08:00

Then, all of a sudden, the black molecule began to grow and grow.

Christmas card sent to Rob Con

concord

2011-11-21T01:23:00.000-08:00

Poised and anticipating take off.

Little Angels

2011-11-19T10:57:00.000-08:00

Thinking about piazzas in Venice maybe or possibly outside a bunker in Berlin. Not a lot to ask for from life really.

Pepper Pot projection WHITE NIGHT BRIGHTON

2011-10-27T05:24:00.000-07:00

The red sculpture to the left is the one that was chosen to be projected onto the Pepper Pot at Queens Park as part of the White Night Festival in Brighton this weekend (Oct 29). I presume it is on a show reel with lots of other pieces by other artists. The other one was the more literal interpretation that I actually created for the project. The organisers thought that the red of the chosen sculpture was more fitting with what they were doing. I did however make a short animation of the creation of the "pepperpot" sculpture before I realised that they couldn't project film. Lucky really as I now have a fully self contained art piece with an inclusive animation that can be shown on a small monitor next to it. Strangely enough the red sculpture also has an alter ego as one half of a 2 part sculpture including a cast iron figure of a Welsh miner.

ring a ring

2011-10-16T06:11:00.000-07:00

Starting to maybe plan a large scale sculpture involving hundreds of little figures crowding across a floor all carrying their own little burden.

Mr and Mrs

2011-09-14T13:11:00.000-07:00

cow

2011-09-12T14:03:00.001-07:00

Burden

2011-09-08T13:04:00.000-07:00

Everything you ever wanted to know about the universe but were too afraid to ask.

Figure with cosmic leanings

2011-08-31T14:46:00.000-07:00

A short stroll through the countryside erupts into cosmic particles attacking with artistic leanings towards abstract expressionism.

5 Black Holes meeting up

2011-07-19T14:13:00.000-07:00

Photo by John House.

Reach for the sky

2011-07-12T13:30:00.000-07:00

A sculpture that has started to reach upwards but inevitably started to overbalance so had to have strutts added to stabalise it. I will eventually make one that reaches from floor to ceiling which seems a very small task up to Brancusi but then often gets delayed by me getting preoccupied with other concepts. The title comes from the 50's film with Keneth Moore about Douglas Bader the fighter pilot who during the war had to have his legs confiscated to stop him escaping. Kind of interesting to view a sculpture in this light.

interStella godess

2011-07-04T03:26:00.000-07:00

A movement through time and space, a collection of particles that occasionally come together in human form and then in a million years or a millionth of a second become part of a planet.

Change is a function of the universe.

Shifting Boundaries update

2011-06-19T14:34:00.000-07:00

"I particularly enjoyed the sculptural installation just inside the door with the video showing it creeping around a house. That was great, really uncanny. Spoke to me about the way in which art is a bit out of place in the home and the need to make it can come to seem like a malevolent presence."

This appeared on an art blog recently. A critic was commenting on the Shifting Boundaries exhibition.

Shifting Boundaries, Doorway sculpture

2011-05-10T13:06:00.001-07:00

Doorway : (2011).

(a doorway becomes a symbol for entry and exit, an opening which leads us through from one space and dimension to another; a portal).

Doorway, which is on exhibition at the Phoenix Gallery in Brighton throughout May, is a site specific work that deals with the concept of inside and out. In its essence it will be more about the movement between the two. The doorway is a set structure that the amorphous sculpture moves through between the two sides, using it both as a support mechanism as well as a framing device. Pictures of a
living room are used as part of the jopinted structure's surface. The pictures incorporate artifacts and scenes from the artist's personal life. The piece includes a TV which is constantly showing a film of the structure actually moving around the original living room space that was photographed to create its "skin". This film acts as a memory of the sculptures existence outside of the exhibition space. How we view reality and the way that we see the world around us is brought into question.

Photos: John House.

Shifting Boundaries

2011-05-03T14:56:00.000-07:00

orbiting black hole

2011-02-07T13:09:00.000-08:00

This will be a part of a 6 piece sculpture which will probably be shown together on a plinth.

The secret lives of 2 black holes.

2010-12-24T07:12:00.000-08:00

This is a card that I sent to Rob Conn. When you open it the black circles slowly move up the card and cover the angels faces. A kind of evangelical eclipse. It also kind of balances out with the moon in the background.

The old Christmas StarTrek feeling hits again

2010-12-24T06:49:00.000-08:00

Probably a Bofars Gun or something that is growing as a table deoration in a Christmas Day bun fight.

I dont know whether this is finished but I might carry on working with it after Christmas. Possibly a fleshy lump should be introduced.

Black dot

2010-12-21T04:05:00.000-08:00

Black Dot No 1.

This is going to be part of an ongoing series that will be suspened in the air (possibly) and will all have dense black dots of black objects as part of them

game sculpture

2010-11-17T13:11:00.000-08:00

The surfaces of the the objects are covered with cut up maps. The idea that somebody could continuously rearrange the parts of the sculpture and play it as an actual game is an added bonus. A kind of endlessly changing sculpture. There are a finite number of possibilities but only if you keep to a rule system.

The 1st Cut

2010-11-11T10:34:00.001-08:00

meteor

2010-11-10T11:39:00.000-08:00

This was produced about a year ago. Its an extension piece to one that I did about 35 years ago where I made a pathway out of burning joss sticks. the columns of smoke were perfectly upright until someone walked into the room. As soon as someone walked along the pathway the displaced air caused the columns of smoke to disperse and move about. It seemed to encourage visitors to be very slow and careful, some just sitting down on the floor to be as still as possible so that the columns weren't disturbed.

The word was coconut

2010-11-09T12:56:00.000-08:00

The endless words formed a rhythm across the page.

little shadows

2010-11-08T14:03:00.000-08:00

3 or 4 years old now these little figures watch over the White family gardens in Dorset.

coconut sculptures

2010-11-07T12:11:00.000-08:00

Worlds within worlds. Somebody once told me about a sculpture that they created which was about going into a supermarket and buying an orange, cutting a small hole in the orange and then inserting a £5 note into the orange and making it look like it hadn't been tampered with. Then going back into the supermarket and replacing the orange. Somebody would get quite a surprise. An artist called Polly who always wore pink and was based at Phoenix in Brighton for a while told me about an art thing that she used to do which was about buying a plain white tee shirt from somewhere like Gap and then printing a political slogan on the shirt and taking it back to the shop. With a receipt she could get a refund and then the shirt would be put on the resale rack. It was a similar thing to a Cildo Merieles thing where he printed political slogans onto Coca Cola bottles and then handed them back in so that they would be returned to the factory, refilled and then resold.

It is strange how people can convey political messages or messages of contempt using other peoples merchandise. I worked in a bakery once where one of the workers used to regularly remove the middle slice of a loaf of bread, take a bite out of the middle of it and then replace it in the loaf to be sent out and sold. Little did he realise that he was joining a long tradition of protest.

gift

2010-08-17T06:03:00.000-07:00

These sculptures are being sent out to different people. There are about 10 in circulation at the moment.

2010-07-19T03:16:00.000-07:00

These are 2 wall sculptures that I recently completed and have led me to consider games such as noughts and crosses.

I am just finishing a nine part wall piece that is based on noughts and crosses.

Brochure download

2010-02-24T14:11:00.000-08:00

This is a link to a downloadable brochure showing my recent work:

http://www.davestephenssculptor.co.uk/DaveStephensBrochure.pdf

Oyster, 2009, readymade and collage.

2010-01-04T06:40:00.000-08:00

Worlds within worlds. Secrets within secrets. A universe within a grain of sand.

xmas sculpture

2009-12-23T09:52:00.000-08:00

The lower sculpture is the start of a series of sculptures that will be wall mounted and interlinked.

The top photo is of one of two sculptures that have taken a year to create. This is not because they have been conceptually difficult but because once Christmas passes it seems a long way away until the next time around. Apart from that I was just interested in the patterned paper rather than the implications of Christmas. The concept of gift has not passed me by however.

2009-10-22T13:53:00.000-07:00

Here are 2 photos of a sculpture created recently.

new work

2009-06-14T07:48:00.000-07:00

Here are some new art works that I have created recently.